Drama happens a lot in the restaurant business. Witness the latest round of chef casualties—Neil Ferguson (Gordon Ramsay), Chris Albrecht (Craftsteak), Ed Witt (Varietal)—and you get just a taste of the constant soap opera that unfolds behind the swinging kitchen doors. But drama is an understatement when one examines the long and winding road that makes up the history of European Union.
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A friend once described for me his ‘can’t miss’ idea for the Bar Mitzvah party to top all other Bar Mitzvah parties: an international theme where each table of guests represents a different country. Not only would the food served at each table represent the cuisine of the country, its flag would be used as a tablecloth, replicas of national monuments would serve as centerpieces
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Restaurant drama at its finest, the saga of E.U. continues: enter Ahktar Nawab, a prominent chef whose last role was chef de cuisine at Craftbar. As Akhtar ambitiously outgrew Craftbar's menu, Tom Colicchio and Akhtar Nawab parted ways. After much anticipation for Akhtar's next role as the chef of Allen & Delancey, a Mediterranean restaurant set to open on the Lower East Side, the venture came up $150,000 short, failing to come to fruition.
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Sometimes in this journey known as life, a few wrenches get tossed into the picture that threaten to derail your grand plans. The other morning, for instance, when Craig and I were attempting to make beignets for some ambitious plans we had for our breakfast, we faced a few such obstacles. I won’t bore you with all the details, but suffice it to say we could not get the beignet dough to puff up in the hot oil. What we were turning out were our own variety of Wheat Thins, not pillowy homemade donuts. We kept trying to get the oil hotter, to roll the dough thinner, to do something to get the recipe to rise, but nothing worked. When we melted our slotted spoon in the oil (oops), leaving the oil swimming with black globules of melted plastic, I was ready to give up and call it a morning. But not Craig. He has much more patience for deep-frying than I do. I believe the patience-for-deep-frying gene is one that is specific to males. We females got the ask-for-directions gene, they got the deep-fry one. Seems fair.
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While the owners of The E.U. wait for their liquor license, they will do the B.Y.O.B. thing rather than delay the opening of their restaurant. On opening night, we were seated at the right time before they started turning people away at the door. The menu is a mix of small plates and sandwiches. They also have a raw bar and offer a few kinds of cheeses. It’s an incredible space with glass panels they open to let the spring air in. Minus the frat boys who brought Bud Light in cans next to us, beautiful people flocked the other tables.
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